


help me get rid of this aftertaste

by kopfkinote



Category: Buzzfeed: Worth It (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Constipation, First Kiss, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 05:03:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14489400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kopfkinote/pseuds/kopfkinote
Summary: Steven gets a job offer and Andrew is a coward.‘You know, I turned down New York for you.’





	help me get rid of this aftertaste

‘You’re sulking,’ Adam says. He’s not even looking at Andrew, instead flicking through various shots of thousand-dollar wine bottles.

‘This is just my face. I’m not sulking,’ he replies, and hopes it’s true.

In his peripheral vision, he sees Adam take his headphones off, and he can feel the laser-like heat of his stare, the one with that soul-piercing look of his that he reserves only for the most exasperated of times. He tries his best to ignore it.

‘So Steven told you, then.’

Andrew exhales harshly, letting out something between a sigh and a scoff, as if he’s been punched in the gut—it certainly feels like it, at least. Even just hearing the name sets off a deeply unpleasant roll of sickness through his stomach; his chest is suddenly too tight and he finds it difficult to inhale again. It’s always been lurking threateningly in the background, ever since Steven did tell him, but it comes back, stronger and in waves, like when he’s left alone for too long or when he catches a glimpse of Steven’s sunshine-incarnate grin on somebody’s social media.

But he doesn’t say any of that to Adam. ‘When did he tell you?’

_I’ve been offered a position in New York. Not Buzzfeed—another company._

‘In Japan, just after we finished the grape video. What about you?’

_I just wanted tell you—because you’re my colleague, yeah, but also because you’re, like, one of my best friends—that I’m considering it. For real._

‘The cake video. In Japan,’ he wrangles the words out of himself, even though they taste bitter as they move through his mouth. ‘At—at the Tasty HQ.’

‘Did he tell you who the offer was from? Vice? Vox?’

No. He didn’t. He shakes his head. He usually doesn’t spend more than three seconds consciously entertaining those kinds of questions. This has suddenly become far too much for him to handle, and he has to squeeze his eyes shut for a moment for the queasiness to pass. Maybe he’s actually getting sick.

Adam, thankfully, doesn’t press him further. He just puts his headphones back on and reoccupies himself with more shots of wine. Then, so quietly Andrew almost thinks he imagines it: ‘He’s not going to leave.’

He wonders how he manages to sound so sure.

-

Worth It as a series hangs on a treacherous precipice of termination after that. Andrew almost feels like he’s floating through some kind of limbo, where everything around him is foggy and he can’t see anything for certain past tomorrow. Nonetheless, he trudges through each day despite the thick tension that lingers throughout the Buzzfeed offices these days.

And during these days, Andrew is more disappointed and grateful than ever, at the same time, for the fact that Steven’s desk is across the building from him. Firstly, he has no idea how to act around him anymore. Steven is so much more perceptive than he lets on, and with the miserably low levels he’s reached these days, Andrew might as well be screaming _I haven’t been able to think about anything other than you for most of my waking hours and I don’t know why I’m so scared that we’re never going to eat truffle or gold together ever again_ in his face, which is not something he’s quite keen to admit, even to himself. Secondly, seeing Steven means actually confronting his thoughts and his traitorous brain is going to try to figure out _why_ he’s so scared, and that’s also something else he doesn’t want to particularly investigate anytime soon.

But he can’t help but feel like time is progressing in some sort of countdown, like he’s running out of time he can spend with Steven, to see his sunshine smile and hear what convoluted metaphors he can come up with to describe food. That, compounded with the fact that they’re in-between seasons and planning has not begun for Season 4 yet even though he knows it’s already been greenlighted by admin, fills him with something that can only be labelled as anxiety.

A braver, bolder Andrew would’ve already gone onto his knees at Steven’s doorstep and begged him to stay. There is a tiny part of him that is far too lacking in dignity and far too abundant in recklessness to do that. But most parts of Andrew are neither brave nor bold, and all he can do is repeat Adam’s quiet affirmation in his head over and over again ( _he’s not going to leave, he’s not going to leave me)_ and hopefully he will prove it true before it’s too late.

The thing is, he knows that the new position, wherever it is, is objectively better for Steven. Better pay, most likely. Better location—he remembers all their New York trips, remembers Steven’s wide-eyed wonder at every little thing in the city. And at some point, he would want to move on from making dumb videos about food and from the YouTube comment section. He’s insanely talented and creative and intelligent so at some point, he would have—has?—grown past a platform like Buzzfeed.

So, if Steven is his friend, Andrew would want what is the best for him. And Steven is his friend.

Yet, Andrew doesn’t even want to entertain the possibility of Steven in any other place than next to him, pressed together in some diner and cheers-ing their food before they eat.

-

It’s the day before the meeting with all the Worth It crew when Steven materialises right in the centre of Andrew’s line of sight, decisively perching himself on the edge of his desk. Andrew might have gulped.

‘You’re blocking the screen,’ he says after a moment, because he can’t think of anything else.

Steven ignores this. ‘You’re getting off work early today, right?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Great,’ he grins. ‘We’re going on a drive tonight, you and I.’

This whole encounter so far feels a bit surreal, and Andrew is stunned. He could be dreaming. It almost feels like an intro to one of their videos, back when their whole schtick was that Andrew pretended to be annoyed by Steven and pretended to hate being dragged along to these trips. Somewhat pointlessly, he notices the way Steven’s hair is more golden than lavender now, and how it falls over his forehead instead of spiked up like it used to be. He also notices that Steven doesn’t look away—the way he can only stand eye contact for a few seconds before it’s too much and he has to look away—but his gaze this time is steady and unwavering and expectant. Andrew draws the moment out, perhaps longer than necessary, because there’s just something about looking at Steven and Steven looking at him that stirs something warm in the pit of his stomach.

He remembers that Steven was expecting a response. ‘Where are we going?’ he asks.

And maybe he imagines it, but something flickers across Steven’s face for a second—relief, maybe? But it’s gone when Andrew looks again, replaced by that familiar bright smile. ‘You’ll find out. I’ll be driving. See you later!’

He hops off the desk with a bit too much force and Andrew barely dodges out of the way of getting a lapful of all of his long, lanky limbs, but Steven simply walks off like nothing happened.

Andrew feels his face grow hot. He decides to blame it on whatever illness he is definitely getting right now and tries to go back to work.

-

Andrew’s been in Steven’s car (or as he calls it, the Worth-It-Mobile) a couple of times outside of the show. Every time feels just as bizarre as the last, without Adam quietly sitting in the back and without cameras attached to the windshield. It’s almost overwhelmingly intimate, a visual reminder that the two of them have indeed crossed the boundary from work friends to friend friends. Or something like that.

The _thud_ as he shuts the door of the passenger seat nearly feels as loud as his own heartbeat in his ears. He honestly doesn’t know why—sure, he doesn’t know where they’re going and for all he knows Steven could drive him into the middle of nowhere and kill him and leave his body to rot, but that seems unlikely, and so the risk involved is disproportionate to how jittery his nerves are currently being.

Maybe Steven notices the tenseness in his body, because he talks more than usual in the car. He asks him questions about work and life and they gossip about who hooked up with who at the latest office party even though neither of them particularly care, and the knots in Andrew’s stomach slowly but surely begin to unravel in the process. He can almost forget the amount of time he had spent agonizing over—Steven himself, ironically.

‘We’re here,’ he says suddenly. It’s some kind of diner—something about it seems oddly familiar.

‘Oh,’ he says when he realizes, then, ‘Steven, aren’t you lactose intolerant?’

‘Not for ice cream, I’m not,’ he replies with a grin, and they head off to the place where they once tried Cuban-cigar-flavoured ice cream.

The place actually has people in it this time, filling the room with a low hum of conversation, and there’s unfamiliar people at the counter and unfamiliar flavours of ice cream. But they recognise them nonetheless, and that’s probably the only reason they let Steven sample almost all of the flavours. Andrew rolls his eyes and pretends like he’s not endeared by it, and he only protests twice before giving into Steven’s insistence that he pay for the both of them.

There’s a dangerous, dangerous silence that they lull into as they dig into the food where Andrew’s mind is allowed to drift off. And as of late, when his brain is on autopilot, they tend to veer sharply down a one-way street called Steven Lim.

‘So,’ his mouth says without his brain’s permission, ‘how’s the whole job offer thing going?’

At this point, his mind is too busy blaring Kill Bill sirens at maximum volume to notice the way Steven’s expression seems to close off at the question, clasping his hands together nervously.

‘To be completely honest,’ he starts slowly, ‘I don’t even know at this point. Like, obviously I have to make a decision soon, but the more I think about the whole thing, the less sure I get. I don’t know.’

‘Steven, it’s okay, you don’t have to tell me—’

He laughs a little. ‘Trust me, if I’d decided, you’d be the first person I’d tell.’ He pokes at the ice cream in his cup. ‘It’s like a bad science experiment.’

Andrew blinks. ‘What?’

‘There’s too many variables. I can’t keep track of all of them. I know it’s a really great opportunity, but,’ he stabs the ice cream again, several times. ‘The last couple of years of my life have been, no doubt, the best years of my life. And it’s because of all this—the series, working with you guys, travelling all over the world, you know? To be honest, at the beginning of it all, I had no idea what I was doing, but I think we got it figured out now.’

Andrew isn’t sure what to say to that, but he nods and allows the quiet smile he feels tugging at his mouth to spread over his face.

Steven smiles back, and there’s a bashful tilt to it that is far more captivating than it should be. ‘I don’t think it could have worked out any other way. I’m really, really glad I met you.’

Andrew lets out a breath. The way he says it is so earnest that he has to look away for a moment. He should be returning the sentiment, because it’s true—god, it’s so true—but he’s just so dumbstruck. He can’t believe this man. He can’t believe the things he says. How does he just say stuff like that and expect him to respond?

For now, he doesn’t have to, because Steven sighs. ‘I just can’t tell the future, Andrew. There are so many ways this could go.’ Then he begins to lay out all the pros and cons, and the way he says it is so rehearsed, like he’s thought of this countless times before. But he also sounds so uncertain and _scared_ and Andrew wishes he could just reach out and touch him and tell him that everything’s going to turn out just the way it’s meant to be and hope they mean the same thing. He wants to be a good friend and listen, but it makes his head ache, so he tries his best to tune it out.

‘I’ll support whatever decision you make,’ he says weakly—it’s not convincing, least of all to himself.

‘Even if I make a “Why I Left Buzzfeed” video?’

A full-on giggle startles out of Andrew at that, and Steven smiles. Even after all this time, it always catches him off guard when Steven makes him laugh. Even after all this time, Steven’s smile always catches him off guard; he can’t believe just how radiant it is, enough to make his stomach curl with warmth every time. Then he realizes something: Steven generally tends to catch him off guard.

He’s not sure what that means, but it hits him with the weight of a revelation.

-

They’re walking back to the car, where afternoon is beginning to meld into evening, the sunset bleeding oranges and pinks and purples into the Los Angeles sky.

Without warning, Steven slides between the space between Andrew and the car door, blocking his path. Their feet are almost touching, Steven against the cool metal of the car. He is so, so close, and there’s a stupid split second in which Andrew thinks Steven is about to kiss him. He takes in a sharp breath.

‘Are you okay?’ Steven cuts across his thoughts, and Andrew sputters, flushes, then nods. Steven’s still looking at him a bit quizzically, but seems to accept it.

‘Listen,’ he says, leaning closer, and there’s an uneasy tinge to the tone that makes the air shift around them immediately. ‘Friend. Buddy. Chum. Andrew.’

‘Steven,’ he answers into the thickness of _something_ between them.

Steven flicks his gaze from the ground to meet his eyes. He does it timidly, almost like he’s peeking at Andrew.

‘Do _you_ think I should stay at Buzzfeed?’

‘Steven,’ he says again, almost like a reflex. ‘I—this is not something you should be asking anyone other than yourself. I can’t answer that.’

‘But you do have an answer, right?’ he presses. Andrew winces at the desperation in his voice. What is he supposed to say to that? As if providing an answer, he feels rather than wills his feet to move, a single long stride backwards, and he suddenly feels so much colder without Steven’s heat clouding over him.

Steven pushes himself off the car door _(holy shit, he’s going to kiss me—)_ and into the driver’s seat. Andrew thinks that the conversation is over, but they’ve been on the road for barely twenty seconds before Steven speaks again, this time with a surprising assertiveness.

‘Just tell me the truth, Andrew. I want to hear it, as your co-worker and as your friend.’

The truth.

The truth is, Andrew can’t imagine a future without Steven. The truth is, it makes him sick to his stomach to think of anyone else in the driver’s seat when they go to restaurants that are too fancy for their own good. The truth is, Steven has somehow weaved himself into every thread of Andrew’s life until they were irrevocably intertwined to each other, and he _matters_ so much now and he _cares_ so much now—

The truth is, Andrew is a coward. But he’s greedy, too—so incredibly greedy, and he’s running out of time.

The truth is, Andrew knows he’s being selfish, but he _wants_ to be fucking selfish for once.

So he says, ‘I want you to stay, Steven.’ Then he says it again, softer this time, so it feels like an admission: ‘I want you to stay.’ _With me_ , he considers adding for a split second, but that feels less like an admission and more like a confession, so he tramples out the thought as soon as it appears. He turns in his seat, where Steven is dutifully, uncharacteristically, keeping his eyes on the road. Mustering every ounce of courage he can let himself have, he adds instead, ‘Of course I do.’

Steven swallows visibly, and Andrew watches the bobbing movement in his neck. He nods once, then twice, almost mechanically. Andrew can only keep on staring, trying to study all the slopes and curves of Steven Lim and trying to make sense of every minute shift in his features. He’s usually so easy to read that it would be a huge understatement to compare him to an open book. But now, with the sunset washing him out in a golden glow, Andrew has never felt more illiterate in his life.

They continue the rest of the journey in tense silence. In the back of his mind, Andrew knows that he crossed the line between staring and ogling several kilometres ago, but his mouth has gone dry and he can feel his heartbeat in his throat with every passing highway exit and he just can’t seem to tear his eyes away. It’s a mix of apprehension and fear and something else he hasn’t quite placed yet. It’s like watching a thriller film, waiting for the suspense to deliver in a gruesome, cruel way.

Whilst merging perfectly into Los Angeles traffic, as if reading his thoughts, Steven finally opens his mouth.

‘I’m not going to take the job offer,’ he says, more to himself than to Andrew. ‘Buzzfeed is such a huge part of my life, you know? This series means so much to me. It’s my baby. And you—all of you mean so much to me. I can’t give that up for something as trivial as money or a city. Like, I _love_ what I do. Going back to Scoops, getting to experience that all over again, that’s just not something that can be replaced by anything, right?’

With every word that comes out of his mouth, Andrew feels warm relief spread throughout his body. He’s not leaving. He’s not leaving him, he’s staying with him.

‘I—I have something else to say.’

His stomach drops. ‘Uh, my blood pressure just instantly tripled, but go on,’ he tries to joke, but it’s probably true.

Steven inhales, long and deep and perhaps even shaky, if Andrew is listening closely. Which he is.

‘I was supposed to have my interview today, at the new place. This afternoon, actually.’

It takes a moment to sink in. But boy, when it does, it sinks into him like a ball of lead.

‘No,’ he shakes his head. ‘No, Steven.’

‘Yes, Andrew,’ he retorts, and the corner of his mouth has risen a little bit. ‘I mean, obviously, I missed the chance, but I already knew that. I made the choice—entirely on my own, I’ll add—to miss the interview because I wanted to go to Scoops with you instead. I wasn’t 100% sure if I was going to stay at Buzzfeed and continue doing Worth It until, like, twenty seconds ago. But I was very sure that I would rather get ice cream with you than go to some stupid job interview for a position that I’m clearly not even that interested in, so I did. And—and you know, talking with you about it—I don’t regret it.’

Andrew’s still shaking his head at him. He’s not even sure if he’s processed all the words Steven just said yet, but in his defence, he’s still reeling from the first piece of information. ‘I’m—this is not fair to you. I’m being selfish and stupid, don’t listen to me. Steven, you can’t let—’

‘Andrew, it’s okay,’ Steven cuts him off gently. His gaze flickers towards him, then to the traffic, then back again. There’s a nervous energy about it, like he’s steeling himself to say something. When he speaks, his voice trembles as if it can’t physically contain all the sincerity he wants to convey: ‘I’m being selfish too.’

-

Andrew is a coward.

He hasn’t talked to Steven in a week. He couldn’t even look him in the eye for longer than a few seconds in the meeting the day after that drive. He’s not avoiding him, per se, but there’s a part of his brain that keeps on telling him _look at what you did, you made Steven miss out on possibly one of the greatest opportunities in his life. Not only that, you went to get ice cream with him even though you knew he was lactose intolerant._ He tells himself it’s guilt, but it’s probably closer to fear. It’s the fear of confronting the implications of what was said and what was left unsaid in that car—because there are implications, but thinking about what they might be is the last thing he wants to do right now. And he is apparently very good at coming up with flimsy excuses to avoid doing so.

Adam does not show any signs of surprise when Steven updates him on his job offer, but then again, this is Adam they are talking about. Steven doesn’t tell him everything; in fact, it’s barely two sentences. Andrew is glaring holes into the desk beside them, feeling like both of them are looking at him, but he’s too scared to check. He feels oddly like an accomplice in a crime. A robbery, if you will, of a great opportunity and a better future for Steven, but in this case, the primary culprit would be Steven Lim himself.

‘You guys went out yesterday, right?’ Adam asks, when they’re back at their desks and it’s just the two of them.

‘Yeah. We had ice cream, at Scoops. Remember that place? It was nice—’

‘He did it for you.’

It’s not an accusation. Adam speaks in statements, not questions, and though they’re not confrontational, it is an effective way of making Andrew confront himself. So that’s what he does, and they’re silent for a long time. Finally, Andrew concedes.

‘I know.’

-

Andrew isn’t dumb.

He knows, somewhere deep inside his brain, an explanation to all of this. Why he had to book an entire tent just for the two of them to eat seafood in Australia. Why he was barely able to enjoy a $208 cake in Japan. Why Steven makes Andrew want to be so goddamn selfish. He knows it, but only with a detached, dulled sort of ache. He knows it, but it hasn’t hit him with a force akin to a freight train like he expected it would. Yet. Rather, he is standing on the rails, watching the train approach him and waiting for it to absolutely wreck him. There’s that same steady, painful thumping in his ribcage, and he stands, patient and motionless, with a sick sort of anticipation. He wonders if it is dread.

-

The alcohol at Eugene’s party leaves Andrew with a cheap, artificially sweet aftertaste on his tongue, but he supposes that after drinking decades-old wine and coffee, nothing can really compare. Nevertheless, he fills up his glass again, trying to quieten the sound of his heart pounding against his ribcage.

He knows Steven is here somewhere, no thanks to Adam, who only dropped this bomb on him as they were entering through the door. Naturally, then, Andrew beelines to the table of drinks, avoiding eye contact with any other potentially-Steven-Lim human being.

Nonetheless, he’s seen Steven a few times tonight. He looks good, he thinks distractedly. He’s wearing another one of his seemingly infinite jackets along with a shirt that shows off the lines of his jaw and neck too much. Too much for Andrew, anyway.

‘You’re avoiding Steven,’ says a voice near him. Adam’s soft-spoken voice contrasts with the slightly done expression on his face that Andrew is slowly becoming more and more familiar with.

‘I’m not. Besides,’ he adds, ‘I didn’t even know he was going to be here. Even if I did, I wouldn’t skip an entire party just to avoid one guy.’

‘Yeah, you would. It’s Steven,’ Adam says it like it’s a fact and not a completely untrue statement bordering on defamation. ‘Do you even remember what this party is for?’

Andrew fiddles with the drink he is currently nursing. ‘Something about the Try Guys?’

Adam sighs, maybe rolls his eyes a little. ‘You, plural, are going through some stuff, I get that. And I know it’s none of my business. But it also kind of is, because you two better get your shit together before we start filming for the next season. I’m not sure I have the capacity to film your emotional constipation for twelve more episodes.’ He takes a sip of his drink. ‘I want this to work out. Don’t you?’ And then he does a heel-turn and leaves, like the dramatic person he pretends not to be.

Yes, Andrew thinks. He wants, of course. He wants to take Steven by the lapels of that stupid jacket, shove him into the wall and push their bodies together, discover how the planes of their body fit and collide until they’re heady with lust. He wants to tug him close by the belt loops of his ripped jeans and push that ridiculous shirt aside so he can press his mouth to the base of his throat, the contact searing. _Did you wear this for me?_ he would smile as he whispered, deep and throaty into his ear, and maybe Steven would reward him with a dried-rose flush—

_Woah._

The thought is aptly punctuated by the sound of some kind of glass shattering, followed by some yelling that is far too cheerful for both the occasion and Andrew’s current mood.

_What the actual fuck, Andrew Ilnyckyj._

-

The balcony has a tranquillity to it that contrasts pleasantly with the commotion going on inside the house. Not only is the night air refreshingly crisp, the glass door muffles a good part of the music and the screaming, and Andrew instantly feels the fog in his head clear slightly. The view isn’t much, but it’s better than watching a bunch of borderline-horny, definitely-drunk adults.

‘Well, look who it is,’ a familiar voice suddenly breaks the silence, and, coincidentally, Andrew’s entire night is ruined at the exact same moment.

‘I swear I didn’t, like, stalk you here or anything,’ Steven says, a bit sheepishly. ‘It was getting a bit too much for me in there is all.’

He feels his eyebrows knit into a frown. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Just needed some air.’ He sidles up next to Andrew, and he can feel Steven’s gaze on the side of his face. The silence swelters with the heat of it, and it’s uncomfortable in a way that has never been the case between the two of them before. After an expectant minute or so, it’s broken by Steven’s deep sigh, which startles Andrew with how frustrated it sounds.

Steven sighs again before he speaks. ‘You know, I turned down New York for you. Because of you? For you, whatever.’ He turns away. ‘And now you won’t even talk to me anymore.’

Andrew feels his mouth open and close several times. Steven leans his arms on the balcony, and the flyaways from his blonde hair illuminated by the fairy lights make him look like he’s wearing a halo. He’s beautiful.

‘I miss you,’ Steven continues, oblivious to Andrew’s stare, with that same frustrated tone. ‘It’s only been, like, a week, but it’s true. I know you’re avoiding me—don’t even try to argue with that, Ilnyckyj, I can see your gears turning.’ The way he says it isn’t malicious; there’s no real bite to it, just teasing, but Andrew’s heartbeat speeds up anxiously at the words nonetheless. He noticed. What else could he have noticed? ‘I’ll admit, I’m not really sure why. You should tell me if I did anything. You know you can tell me anything, right? Anyway. I miss you. It feels weird, not hearing your sarcastic little quips to all the dumb things I say. I even miss your bad food puns.’

‘I—’ he swallows, around a lump in his throat and a heaviness in his heart. ‘I miss you too.’

And Steven smiles even as he scoffs, like he just _can’t_ believe this guy. Andrew likes it. He likes being unbelievable to Steven. He likes the idea of being too much; he likes the idea of showering Steven with more and more pieces of himself until he occupies every inch and corner of his mind like Steven has in Andrew.

But he can’t say any of that, so he tries to shove those thoughts away as far as possible from his mouth and watches his knuckles turn white as they grip the balcony railing tighter, tries to force himself to release them.

‘Why did you avoid me?’ Steven asks quietly, and maybe Andrew is imagining the slight sting in his voice.

He swallows. ‘I was scared.’ And it’s true, but it’s too simplistic, too insignificant, not nearly enough to encapture all the complexities of what he feels. But it’s the truth he allows himself to admit right now.

‘Of what?’

‘My turn,’ Andrew cuts him off, a little too quickly. Steven looks at him in slight surprise. ‘Do you regret missing the interview?’

‘No,’ he answers immediately. ‘To be honest, I don’t think I ever was going to go. Everything I said that day, Andrew, I—it was all true, I stand by everything I said. I think I made the right choice.’ There’s a slight pause before he asks: ‘Do _you_ think I made the right choice?’

He doesn’t ask it like he asked it a week ago in a parking lot when he was ditching his job interview, laced with doubt and desperation; this time is much more confident and self-assured, like how he talks when he has his mind set on something, when he knows exactly what he wants and how to get it. It’s a tone usually used on project managers and fancy business executives, but now he gets to be on the same end as them of this voice. It’s so demanding of Andrew—he feels like he has no choice but to answer honestly.

‘Yes,’ he says, even though he’s not entirely certain. So instead he says something he is certain of: ‘I—I wanted you to. The show is more yours than any of ours, and we would not have been able to keep doing it without you. It would feel—wrong. I wouldn’t want to do it. And I like doing this, a _lot_ , Steven. So I’m glad you made the choice that you did.’

He doesn’t look at Steven while he says all of this. But when he does turn to look at him, he’s a little surprised to see that Steven is already looking back. There’s something in his face that Andrew can’t exactly pinpoint, but it makes him stop and stare.

‘In the car, on the drive home from Scoops,’ he says. ‘You said you were being selfish. About staying here. What did you mean by that?’

‘I—’ Steven stops too. ‘I’m not sure.’

Andrew can hear it when Steven breathes out then, which somehow causes him to be hyper-aware of every other minute movement that he makes. He notices how his eyelashes move with every timid waiver of his gaze. He notices how the night breeze makes his hair shift, ignoring the impulse to brush it out of his forehead. But in the next moment his eyes trace the movement of his tongue when he licks his lips and feels himself flush impossibly warm and he has to look away then.

There’s something about the charge apparent in the air them that makes Andrew want to _push_. He wants to push at Steven, ask him questions that shudder as they escape from his throat, ask him things he’s too afraid to know the answer to. He wants to push how far he can go, test how far the rubber band can stretch before it snaps.

So he reaches his hand out into the space between them. There’s a moment of hesitation that lasts a second too long, his arm awkwardly hanging out halfway, but he draws a burst of courage and pushes through, gripping Steven’s upper arm with probably enough strength to be painful. But Steven doesn’t object, and when he doesn’t, it feels like a victory. He just keeps on looking at Andrew with the same unreadable expression. Andrew looks back, hanging onto the contact like it’s some sort of lifeline. He’s reminded of that moment in the parking lot with Steven sandwiched between his body and the car, and he remembers hoping that Steven would kiss him. It was hoping, he realises now.

‘Tell me what you’re thinking,’ he blurts out, because he suddenly needs to know very, very badly. It’s going to happen. It’s going to happen, he’s sure of it, he can feel it on the back of his neck and the tips of his fingers.

‘Andrew,’ he says, soft and indecipherable. Andrew wants to ask him _what._ What he means when he says his name like that. What he means when he leans closer into his space like that, too close but not enough to touch. What he means when he lingers outside the door of his hotel room a moment too long before he says goodnight.

There is a slight tremor where his hand is clutching onto Steven’s arm now.

Andrew tightens his fist into Steven’s jacket to steady it, then over his shirt, then his hands travel up and up and slower now, growing less sure of themselves with the warmth of bare skin beneath them. He stops with his palm cupping the side of his neck, thumb absentmindedly brushing the line of his jaw. He searches, then, for something in Steven’s face that might tell him to stop. But there’s nothing like that, just an intensity that makes Andrew heat from the inside out.

‘Andrew,’ he says again, but it doesn’t sound like a warning—more of an acknowledgement of some sort, though there’s a certain hesitance to it. ‘I, uh.’

He takes a small step towards him, and his lips are parted and god, he just looks so fucking _kissable_ like that and Andrew is suddenly very, very aware that Steven’s face is suddenly very, very close to his face and _oh._

There goes the freight train.

Steven’s lips are so soft and so, so gentle against his, and it’s barely two seconds, but it still knocks him stunned like he has been slammed into a wall. Andrew feels his mouth open helplessly under the touch, and he lets out a noise from the back of his throat, low and guttural, and feels Steven exhale shakily against his lips.

It’s all so _delicate_ . When Steven kisses Andrew, he holds him like he might shatter into pieces at any moment, long fingers curled around the nape of his neck and pressing into the dip of his back, all feather-touch. Andrew lets himself be held, lets himself be kissed, despite the fact that every limb in his body is _thrumming_ with the urge to run his hands up and down his chest and pull at his hair and bite on his bottom lip, that he wants nothing more than to tear a wanton moan from his throat and feel it vibrate against his lips. But then Steven brings his hand up to where Andrew’s is cradling the side of his face; he just holds it there as he kisses him, slow and sweet, and the only word that he can think of is _tender_ and he might lose his mind if he doesn’t know what Steven’s mouth tastes like right now.

So when Steven pulls back slightly, Andrew seizes the collar of his jacket and brings their mouths together again, this time with tongue and teeth and he desperately chases the taste of that cheap champagne from earlier—but also thousand-dollar wine and barrel-aged coffee and truffle and everything else as well, and Steven whines as he opens his mouth for him and Andrew drinks that in, too. Their lips shiver when they slide together, wet and warm and restless, like neither of them have the capacity to hold in this—whatever—between them anymore.

‘I’m sorry,’ he pants, mouthing sloppily onto the column of his throat, breath hot. ‘I’m sorry I avoided you. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth sooner. Steven, I was so selfish, I was such a coward, Steven, I—’

‘You know, I would usually appreciate a nice heartfelt apology like this,’ and Steven’s a little out of breath too, ‘but I’ve literally been waiting for you to kiss me since Korea, so—’

Andrew is afraid that whatever noise comes out of his mouth in response to that is going to be mortifyingly pathetic, so he just drags his lips up and kisses him again, digging his nails slightly harder into his waist.

Faintly, they both recognise that there is going to be an aftermath to this, consequences further down the road, and maybe that is why they kiss each other like they might never get the chance again. Andrew savours every scorching point of contact between their bodies, every tiny sound Steven makes, and he is in love with every second of it.

He’s in love with how soft Steven’s hair feels when he cards his fingers through them; he’s in love with the way his name tastes when Steven whimpers it into his mouth; he’s in love with how Steven clutches at his hips to pull him closer, squeezing tightly like he can never get close enough. He’s in love, he’s in love, he’s in love.

When they finally separate with a soft, wet sound, Andrew buries his face into the crook of his neck. He’s not sure if he can handle the sight of Steven right now, absolutely ruined by kisses with his lips all swollen and eyes half-lidded. He can still feel the slight tremble of his own body rushing with the incredulousness of it all, and he holds Steven even tighter until he steadies. He inhales deeply. Steven smells sweet and earthy, and Andrew thinks that he could stay like this forever.

But he eventually has to pull back, and it’s like the freight train has hit him all over again. There is a sinful reddish shine on his lips and his clothes are dishevelled and his hair is mussed where Andrew pulled at it. He feels even more wrecked than Steven looks, and it’s all so unfair.

‘Uh,’ and his voice comes out much rougher than he expects, and he clears his throat. ‘So.’

Steven’s smiling slightly—he’s so fucking beautiful. ‘So.’

‘That was a thing that happened.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Is it a thing you might want to happen again sometime?’

‘Yeah. Many, many times, if you don’t mind.’

‘Sounds good to me.’

And it’s as simple as that.

**Author's Note:**

> title from bitter pill by urbanation  
> find me on [tumblr](https://kopfkinote.tumblr.com/ask)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] help me get rid of this aftertaste](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17060876) by [Shmaylor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shmaylor/pseuds/Shmaylor)




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